WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Border Security and Enforcement Chairman Clay Higgins (R-LA) and Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Accountability Chairman Dan Bishop (R-NC) delivered the following opening statements in a hearing to examine how the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Refugee Resettlement’s (ORR) processing of unaccompanied alien children (UACs) has led to an increasing number of missing and exploited children after they have crossed the border under the Biden-Harris administration.

Watch Chairman Higgins’ full opening statement.

As prepared for delivery:

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Subcommittee on Border Security and Enforcement and the Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Accountability joint hearing on the trafficking, exploitation, and missing unaccompanied children at the Southwest border.

We are here today to examine how the Biden-Harris administration’s open border policies have allowed dangerous cartels, criminals, and human traffickers to prey upon the world’s most vulnerable people – unaccompanied children.

Our Committee has been actively engaged in addressing this important issue.

In August, I, along with Chairmen Green and Bishop, sent a letter to the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Humanitarian Services and Director of the Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement, Robin Dunn Marcos, requesting critical information on the screening and vetting of potential sponsors.

In September, Chairman Bishop and I held a member briefing with officials from the Department of Homeland Security and Health and Human Services to better understand how DHS encounters, screens, and transfers unaccompanied children to HHS and how HHS subsequently places these children with potential sponsors.

As the administration’s border crisis continues to spiral out of control, the number of unaccompanied minors arriving at the Southwest border has skyrocketed, turning the situation at the border into a devastating humanitarian catastrophe.

In fact, the Biden-Harris administration has encountered nearly 530,000 alien children at the border to date. In comparison, the previous Trump administration had less than half that number.

America, ask yourself, “why are so many children arriving at the border alone and afraid and sometimes in the hands of unconfirmed ‘relatives’ with no apparent familial indicators?” These children show up with arbitrary phone numbers and addresses scribbled across their arms as if they are a package arriving at somebody’s doorstep. Some children arrive at the border drugged, preventing law enforcement authorities from questioning them about those they are traveling with. This is a moral outrage.

The Biden-Harris administration has touted that they have the most “humanitarian” border policies in history. Yet, there is nothing humanitarian about enabling the cartels to exploit, abuse, and profit from vulnerable children!

Once the children enter the United States, Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and Health and Human Services (HHS), are tasked with their well-being and safety.

Initially, CBP works to process and screen these children once they are encountered at the border. Next, HHS works to identify and place them with a potential sponsor. Finally, ICE works to ensure they follow through with their immigration court proceedings. However, these agencies do not have the capacity or resources to handle the sheer number of children who have crossed the border in the last four years.

Compounding this crisis, the administration is not thoroughly vetting potential sponsors. According to information leaked to the media, Health and Human Services reportedly lost contact with more than 85,000 unaccompanied children between 2021 and 2023. Think about that. That is the size of the city of Lake Charles, LA.

We are appalled that our government has neglected its primary duty to protect the safety and well-being of these children placed in our care.

It is entirely unacceptable that the Biden-Harris administration has allowed human traffickers to take advantage of this ongoing border crisis.

We have a responsibility to our nation to fight against this scourge of human trafficking and to find the children that are currently missing.

I would like to express my thanks to our witnesses for appearing before the Committee today.

Before I yield to the Ranking Member of the Border Security Subcommittee, Mr. Correa, I first would like to thank my good friend and colleague, Representative Dan Bishop (from the great state of North Carolina), for joining me one last time as we work together to bring awareness to this very important topic.

After winning a special election in 2019, Mr. Bishop was appointed a seat on the House Homeland Security Committee. He later became Chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Accountability in 2023.

Known for his tenacious questioning of hostile bureaucrats who have come to testify before both this Committee and the House Judiciary Committee, where he also serves, Dan has devoted himself to combating the abuse of weaponized government.

Dan is an extraordinary champion of the right to free speech, defending the homeland through strong border security and enforcing the immigration laws passed by Congress.

Agree or disagree with him on policy, Dan’s intellectual rigor and command of the law are indisputable and have earned him the respect of colleagues on both sides of the aisle – and there is never any doubt about where he stands.

It has been an honor to serve with him on this Committee, and I am sure that he will continue to use his God-given talents to serve our country.

Watch Chairman Bishop’s full opening statement.

As prepared for delivery:

I want to thank our witnesses for joining us today to examine this tragic crisis enabled by the Biden-Harris Administration’s gross mismanagement of caring for migrant children.

Under the Biden-Harris Administration, over 526,000 unaccompanied alien children – or UACs – have crossed the southwest border – an unprecedented number. Each year from 2021 to 2023, CBP encountered over 130,000 unaccompanied children – more than twice the levels seen under the Obama and Trump administrations.

While CBP is usually the first point of contact for UACs who cross the border, the Health and Human Services Department’s Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) is primarily responsible for the care and placement of these children. Much of this work is done in partnership with nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) that provide shelter and services.

Under the Biden-Harris Administration, these NGOs received a windfall of taxpayer money through ORR, whose budget for its unaccompanied children program was 6.9 billion dollars in FY 2023.

Southwest Key Programs, the largest housing provider of unaccompanied children, received more than 2.5 billion dollars in taxpayer funding over the past three years. This summer, the federal government sued Southwest Key, alleging that employees engaged in a pattern of sexual abuse and harassment against the children in its shelters and failed to take sufficient action to protect the children in its care.

Another company, Deployed Resources, has had a contract for a migrant facility in Greensboro, North Carolina since May 2022.

39.5 million dollars has already been spent, with another 64 million dollars obligated, but incredibly, according to HHS, no children have been in care at the facility from the time it became operational in March until it went into standby in June.

What did we spend all that money on?

The Biden-Harris Administration placed political aims above the welfare of unaccompanied migrant children who crossed, or were trafficked across, the southern border, releasing UACs with inadequate vetting and follow-up to avoid the bad optics of crowded facilities.

ORR releases children to sponsors in the United States. Thorough vetting of these sponsors is absolutely critical. Unfortunately, the Biden-Harris Administration’s push to quickly release migrants resulted in countless cases of migrant children being released to sponsors with major red flags, placing children at risk of exploitation.

Far too often, children are released to sponsors who do not care about their welfare and intend to exploit the child through child labor or more heinous forms of trafficking.

Should we really be rushing to release children to individuals who are trying to sponsor multiple unrelated migrant children?

This is a systemic failure that has put thousands of vulnerable children in risky situations here in the United States.

This failure goes well beyond the vetting issues on the front end. As an inspector general report earlier this year made clear that the federal government cannot account for tens of thousands of children that HHS released to sponsors. 

32,000 children didn’t show up for their immigration court hearings.

Those hearing dates are one of the only opportunities that ICE must engage with unaccompanied children and observe signs of trafficking or exploitation.

What happened to those 32,000 children? We don’t know. We can’t reach them.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Over 290,000 have been released by HHS without a notice to appear for an immigration court date. There is no way for ICE to monitor the location and status of these migrant children or verify their safety.

We’ve asked and even subpoenaed HHS for information about the screening of potential sponsors and the children that they’ve lost contact with.

What is happening to these migrant children?

In many cases documented by investigative journalists with the New York Times, children released to sponsors, who may not even be related to the child, ended up working dangerous jobs to pay off debt or send money back home, often working night shifts or dropping out of school.

Mr. Chairman, I request to enter three articles into the record: Alone and Exploited, Migrant Children Work Brutal Jobs Across the U.S.; As Migrant Children Were Put to Work, U.S. Ignored Warnings; and U.S. Failed to Safeguard Many Migrant Children, Review Finds.

The federal government is facilitating this humanitarian catastrophe.

The unaccompanied children are released from the HHS shelters right into the hands of these sponsors, despite multiple warnings from staffers within the agency that the vetting process was failing to protect children.

The Biden-Harris Administration was so focused on moving people through the system as fast as they could that they failed to ensure the safety of the children they were releasing.

Many of these children already suffered at the hands of criminal cartels on the treacherous journey to the border, only to find themselves exploited again after leaving government custody.

The human cost of this crisis is simply heartbreaking and tragic. I look forward to the testimony of our witnesses as we shine a light on this monumental failure.

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